Where My Feet Are

Where My Feet Are

Sideman

By the time I leave for Bali, I know something inside my life needs to change. I just don’t know what.

I board a 23-hour flight from Los Angeles to Bali, leaving everything familiar behind. Gazing out the window, seeing nothing but endless blue sky, I make a declaration to myself: I will live in the present, right here, right now, where my feet are. I repeat the words, willing them to take hold. Somewhere along the flight I notice my shoulders relax, as if my body understands before my mind does.

I arrive in Denpasar at dawn and hire a driver to take me two hours into the forest and hills of Sidemen Valley. Valerie insisted I begin here.

“Sidemen is tranquil, peaceful.” she said. “Perfect for a digital detox.”

“A what?”

“No phone,” she laughed. “You won’t miss it.”

She was right.

My resort sits amongst emerald green rice forests beneath Mount Agung. Palm trees scatter across the valley and morning mist hangs over the rice terraces like gauze. The valley reveals itself as the sun rises, shapes emerging from the soft white veil. At sunrise the sky turns gold and orange. I sit on the terrace breathing with intention as the radiance spills over the mountain. I sit there longer than I expect.

For years my mornings began with noise, emails, responsibilities, someone needing something from me. Here there is nothing asking for my attentiveness. I realize how long it has been since I have simply existed inside a moment.

Bali is often referred to as the “Island of the Gods”, believing it is where the divine, nature and the earthly exist in perfect harmony. I walk through the rice fields repeating my mantra: where my feet are. I lose track of time entirely. The silence feels unfamiliar, but not uncomfortable. A switch seems to flip inside, I find it cozy, like a soft blanket.

Breakfast is tea, fruit, and journaling. I jot down my thoughts and I write my intentions for the day. Lucky comes to mind. Thoughts of him arrive like small waves touching the shore. His translucent brown eyes, the way he looks at me, the way I feel alive…..

I push those thoughts out of my mind, instead focusing on the here and now. A guide suggests I try Melukat, a Balinese water purification ritual meant to release emotional heaviness. Considering the past few years of my life, I agree.

The guide takes me to a sacred spring where a priest leads the ritual. I step into the cool holy water, bend down and let it run over my head, shoulders, my body. I close my eyes and imagine grief loosening its grip, dissolving, carried away by the current. When I step out of the water, I feel strangely lighter.

Later there is yoga, practiced outdoors while rain is tap dancing on leaves and insects hum in the forest. After class, I glide into the pool and float on my back watching clouds drift through the sky. Watching them, I have the odd sensation that I too am learning how to move, drift differently through the world. For the first time in years, instead of feeling ashamed, my body is beginning to feel like something I want to cherish, somewhere I want to live.

Evenings end with a small gratitude ritual at sunset. I sleep soundly and wake before dawn to begin again.

Eventually, it is time to leave Sidemen.

Candidasa

I leave the mountains for the coast, where Valerie lives in the quaint seaside village of Candidasa.

My bungalow sits directly on the ocean. Each morning I walk the beach as the sun lifts over the water, the sky bursting with colors that reflect across the aquamarine sea. I sit in the sand and watch the tide move in and out. Going into meditation. I feel my restlessness begin to relax. I begin to understand that peace is not something I have to search for. It has been waiting underneath the noise all along.

One morning as I open my door to head to the beach, a woman from the staff was placing a basket on the ground outside my room. She bows her head for a moment before standing and walking away. Inside the basket are marigold petals, grains of rice, and a thin stick of incense curling smoke into the morning air.

I ask Valerie about it.

“An offering,” she says. “A thank you to the gods for today.”

The next morning, I pause beside the little basket before stepping past it, I close my eyes. Not praying exactly, just saying thank you. Grateful, for this moment and this day.

Yoga is early. After class we remain lying on our mats while the instructor introduces us to a sound bath. Singing bowls and gongs vibrate through the air, their tones moving through my body like waves. The sound travels through my chest and spine, long after the instruments stop. There is a pulse inside of me; the woman I was continues to disappear into the distant, like someone I remember, rather than someone I am.

Valerie invites me to lunches with her friends. Everyone brings food, Balinese dishes. There is no pretense here, no titles, no social hierarchies. Just friendship. I begin to understand why she stayed.

The days lose their edges in the best possible way. With the exception of visiting Valerie’s home, I rarely leave the beach. Everything I need is here.

Ubud

Before leaving Candidasa I briefly check my phone. Several messages from Michael, one from Lucky.

Michael sends photos of Maddie, growing bigger by the day. Lucky’s message is short, casual. He includes a picture of a large fish he caught. I stare at it before putting the phone away. Again, not sure how to respond. It’s almost like the distance between us feels normal now. I wonder does he feels the same… or not?

I travel inland again to an area north of Ubud where jungle valleys and rice terraces spill across the hillsides. While similar to Sideman, north Ubud has its own energy. Walking the narrow paths through the terraces, I realize the longer I stay in Bali, the less I feel a need to be anywhere else. I like being here, right where my feet are.

Yoga continues to root me in presence. More layers are peeled away, more realization bubbles to the surface. Happiness is not something waiting somewhere outside. It lives here, inside me.

A guide takes me to a hidden waterfall. We walk silently through the jungle until the sound of rushing water fills the air. When we reach the clearing, sunlight scatters through the falling water like glass. The guide gestures for me to step forward. Standing beneath the waterfall, I stop resisting it. There was no more holding back. I feel myself break open. Spirit embodies my being, fills me with love, peace and fulfillment. I have everything I need now. I am enough.

Later, walking back through the jungle, I realize I haven’t thought about Lucky all morning. The realization surprises me. Not because I stopped caring about him. Because I finally stop needing him.

Lovina

For my final two weeks I travel north to Lovina Beach which is best known for its relaxed vibe, black volcanic sand beaches, and early morning dolphin-watching tours. A perfect place to end my journey in tranquility.

I join an early morning boat tour. Local guides take us out on traditional wooden boats known as a Jukung, to hopefully catch a glimpse of a few dolphins.

Out of nowhere, as if the gods parted the ocean just for us, we are in a middle of a rare sighting; a super pod of dolphins. Thousands of dolphins leaping effortlessly through the water, silver bodies flashing in the brilliance of the morning sunrise. Their whistles and frenzied splashes so loud, it’s as if we are voyeurs in the middle of an elaborate party. The dolphins are completely unaware that we are here. They having the time of their life, not a care in the world. Free. In the moment. Not crying over yesterday, not worrying about tomorrow. Mother nature at its finest.

The answer is clear now.

Being free, feeling free, I believed was controlled by forces outside me. Standing here watching these elegant mammals, I finally understand freedom, my true path, has always belonged to me.

I realize how far away my old life now feels. Lucky belongs to that life. I’ve changed. The woman who needed his sex, no longer exists. I can’t help but wonder what will it be like between us when I return home?

After eight weeks in Bali, my transformation is undeniable. The woman who arrived here carried shame, doubt, fear, old grief. One by one they have each fallen away, giving way to an inner magic, to an understanding of how life works. It’s really so simple.

Before leaving the island, I place a small offering to the gods, an offering of flowers by the sea and whisper the same words the Balinese taught me to say each morning:

“Thank you for today.”

As the plane lifts above, Bali disappears beneath the clouds. The sky is a brilliant rainbow of orange, red and yellow colors lit up by the evening sunset. I realize that along the way, without quite noticing when it happened, the cocoon I had been living inside has dissolved. I feel light, like a butterfly finally knowing how to fly. I am a free spirit.